Dandelion Flower Dye - One Yellow, Three Greens

On the first of April I turned the page of my calendar to see a picture of dandelion dyes. The day was sunny and light of heart with the promise of spring, I grabbed a bag and set off for my usual hunting ground, a wide verge beside the A48. 
Sure enough, the grass was ablaze with dandelion flowers. I used to feel horribly self conscious crouching to pick them as fast as I could, imagining people driving past might consider me foolish. This year, that galvanising thought had barely occurred to me before the verge was stripped. Once I got home, I found I had only 700g of dandelions, rather less than the usual kilogramme.

I simmered the flowers for an hour and looked for some fibres to dye. This 200g of super chunky singles wool yarn from World of Wool was mordanted with alum a couple of years ago and has been lurking at the bottom of the basket because I've previously found the white Cheviot yarn didn't seem to take up much from plant dye baths.

The following day, the skeins of yarn were simmered in the dandelion dye bath for an hour and left to cool. The day after that, I hooked them out for a look at the result and my companion, Elinor Gotland, glanced up from doing her crossword.
"Of all the weeds in all of Wales, that is the most weedy yellow you've ever dyed, Beaut."
"Mmm, not enough sunshine yet, not enough dandelions and not the ideal yarn, either. Still, I've not given up hope. This dye bath has been fermenting for a couple of days, it's bound to be acidic. The colour will look better after a rinse in plain water."

Though my companion looked dubious, I wasn't wrong. The skein on the far left of this photo was simply rinsed and dried, the second was reheated in half the dye bath with a splash of iron solution before rinsing and the third was reheated with copper solution, which modifies colour best in an acidic environment. The fourth was originally the grey skein, proving once again that yellow + grey = green.

All four skeins were knitted into an entrelac bag which was felted in the washing machine with colour washing powder. I expected the alkaline powder to intensify the dandelion dye colours even further and I'd say the plain yellow, the grey base and the copper modified greens did get marginally stronger. One surprise, the iron modified skein shifted to a rather beige toned green variation, which hasn't happened before. 

I'd never claim to be astonished by beige, that just seems to be the default state for amateur natural dyers. I stared moodily at the beige sections of the bag.
My companion waved a hoof.
"Cheer up Chicken, it's Easter, the family are coming and it's time to hide chocolate in the garden."

Elinor will not be missing a trick from her eagle's nest. 
I suspect all my eggs may end up in one basket.